CV Therapeutics Q3 2007 Earnings Call Transcript

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2007-11-06 17:30:20.0

Tags: CV Therapeutics Inc.

Question-and-Answer Session

Operator

(Operator Instructions). Your first question comes from the line of Mark Monane, with Needham.

Mark Monane - Needham

Thank you very much for taking my question, and for the thorough review of the busy quarter.

Lou Lange

Hi, Mark.

Mark Monane - Needham

A couple of questions. Can you go over for us the mechanism where we you think ranolazine may work in diabetic patients, and do you think this may lead to it uses a agent as anti-diabetic in an of itself or in patients that have concomitant, angina and diabetes?

Lou Lange

Yeah. Thanks, Mark. Well, as we said in whatever recent press releases based on the data that we have today, ranolazine stimulates the secretion of insulin from neveda islet at the presence of glucose. And it appears to do this by inhibiting the same two line channels that it blocks in the heart work close cotenant. So, therefore, would be first in the class. That's why we see no hyperglycemia in the database, and as I said, the FDA is interested in the clinical data in the two studies--CARISA and MERLIN on diabetes--they are taking it very serious, and why they are taking serious is our interest in pursuing a claim in hemoglobin A1c reduction in coronary artery disease patients.

Mark Monane - Needham

Okay. Got it, in patients with underlying disease, I got it. And in terms of the prescription, do we have a sense of how many is coming from new prescribers versus people that are getting [rethought] for current prescriptions and is the prescription length being done, since we are using the PBMs now we noticed the increased prescription length as people move to the mail service which is very profitable for these organization?

Dan Spiegelman

Yeah, Mark, so our NRx as a percentage of our total prescription is running at around 40%, that’s been pretty consistent over prior weeks and months. Average prescription site has not changed much, it's around 78 days, it is trickling up a little, but it hasn’t changed a lot.

Mark Monane - Needham

Okay. That’s helpful. And one more question from [Allen Car], go ahead.

Allen Car - Needham

Hi, could you elaborate on the $1.1 million that was included in Ranexa sales for the quarter--there is a reason behind that adjustment?

Dan Spiegelman

Sure. So, since launch we have made an estimate of how much out of current growth sales we should reserve for future potential return, and since launch, in fact, we have had no return, and wholesale is doing a very steady and consistent job managing their inventory levels. And so, we concluded that risk of future returns as a percentage of future sales was smaller than we had originally estimated. And so, we reduced our reserve for future possible returns by $1.1 million, so added that to revenues in this quarter.

 

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